From time to time, I really enjoy dolling myself up in the style of the 1940s. I curl my hair, put together an outfit, try out a new style of makeup, and so on. This look might be the most authentic one I ever created!

Mini skirts, heavy eyeliner, and crazy beehive hair. These things can only refer to one decade in history: the sixties! My style usually goes more towards the 40s and 50s, but for this article I went for something entirely different.

It’s all in the details and the same goes for an authentic vintage look. Even when you’re wearing the most gorgeous vintage dress or your hair is perfectly done up a couple of small accessories can add that little bit extra to your outfit. In this article I’ll be giving you a couple of simple tips on how to achieve that!

I especially love wearable retro and vintage, but every now and then I really enjoy putting together an outfit that looks very fancy and very 1950s. An outfit like this one, with my faux fur coat and vintage gloves definitely has some of that ‘stylish lady from the 1950s’ vibe!

Berets are very trendy right now, and because I quite like hats I decided to give this trend a go as well. This outfit has somewhat of a French and at the same time 70s feel to it, and it makes me feel very comfortable!

Today’s article is a bit different from my usual articles I post. In the last article I wrote I told you more about the analog photography I’ve been testing out with my boyfriend and a little while back he took some pictures of a retro outfit I was wearing with one of his analog cameras. When I saw the pictures I thought they looked very nice so I decided to use them for an outfit article!

I adore women’s trousers from the 1940s. They are high-waisted, elegant and very comfortable. The sad thing is that they’re often very difficult to come across. Whenever I then happen to find some vintage inspired trousers in a modern fashion store I get really excited! I found these amazing checkered trousers at Primark, definitely not the first store I would have a look to find something like this. I styled this outfit based on some pictures from the 1940s you can find on the internet. In the 40s, most people still wore skirts and dresses, but trousers became more and more popular and were often worn with a blouse. Outfits like this one show that trousers can be stylish and feminine.

I thought the combination of the trousers and the blouse felt kind of tough 1940s, so I decided to pair it with a hairstyle I hadn’t tried before. I’ve always loved the way ‘Betty bangs’ (short, straight bangs inspired by the pin-up Betty Page) looked, but it seemed like too much of a hassle to style and trim every time. An easy alternative for such a hairstyle are ‘bumper bangs’, bangs that look like proper Betty bangs, but that don’t require you cutting your hair. You can create this hairstyle by taking the front pieces of your hair and either roll them up by hand or roll them around a ‘bun maker’ (a hair donut you cut in half or something similar). It isn’t an easy hairstyle to manage at first, but you should get the hang of it with a bit of practise.

The rest of the outfit is quite simple and consists of items I wear quite regularly. The glasses are my favourite pair that I wear all the time, the earrings are vintage and are worn with a lot of retro outfits and the shoes are comfortable lace up shoes that, even though they’re quite bright, go with a lot of different outfits. I’m very happy with how these pictures turned out, because they’re the only pictures my boyfriend took and they’re all fun and in focus. Analog photography is always exciting and that’s exactly what makes it so much fun 😉

Everyone who knows a little about me, knows that I love anything vintage. Analog photography is something I had been wanting to try out for a couple of years, but I’ve never gotten around to it. Together with my boyfriend I bought a roll of film and we went out to try out our new (old) cameras. You can see the results from our trip in this article!

My father studied art when he was younger, and for that he needed a camera. He always stored his camera nicely in a bag, and I had had my eye on it for quite a while. Because I didn’t know enough about analog photography yet I left the camera in the bag, but a couple of months ago I decided I really wanted to try it out after all. My boyfriend had also found an analog camera (on a flea market) and together we went on a little stroll. It’s always a surprise to find out whether an old camera still works. The light meter could be broken or there could be too much dust inside the camera. Yesterday I picked up my developed pictures and they actually turned out really nice!

The camera I took pictures with is a Chinon CM-4s, a camera from the beginning of the 80s. The camera is quite light and compact, so it’s perfect to take with you. The biggest question with this camera was whether the light meter still worked. The Chinon comes with a light next to the viewfinder that lights up green when you have chosen the right settings and red when it’s over- or underexposed. If you know a little bit about photography you know that you can adapt the lighting by playing around with the shutter speed and the diaphragm. This all goes automatically with new and modern cameras, but you need to do all of this manually with older cameras. It takes a bit of getting used to, but you’ll get the hang of it after a while.

I took my camera with me on outings for a couple of months. We went to Antwerp to take pictures and we went on a walk. With analog photography you really have to keep in mind that a standard roll of film only comes with 24 pictures (a bigger one with 36) and that aren’t a lot of pictures at all. You have to really think about the pictures you take and you’ll find that you don’t just take pictures of everything you see.

What makes analog photography even more exciting is the fact that you only knwo what your pictures look like after you’ve had it developed. YOu take the 24 pictures, you take the film out of your camera, you send it to some kind of photo service, you wait about two weeks, and then you can see the results. It’s completely different form today’s photography with pictures that are posted on social media almost instantly, but I kind of like this better 😉

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Welcome! I am Hannelore, the girl behind the blog. I am a 22 year old girl aspiring to live a vintage lifestyle. I adore the 1940s & 1950s, but I like to mix things up and also wear modern looks whenever I feel like it. If you have any questions or suggestions, feel free to contact me!